Best practices, case studies and resources for CRM and digital marketers

Top 10 E-commerce Thought Leaders

June 3, 2013

As part of our ongoing series on thought leaders in the data-driven marketing series, we’re turning our attention to the e-commerce industry. Retailers can learn a lot from leading e-commerce brands that are skilled at collecting and leveraging customer data into marketing ROI.

The following list of thought leaders are leading the charge on high value initiatives like improving their customer understanding and segmentation, personalization and data-driven marketing. They score highly in online Influence (one of many data attributes captured by TrueLens) and/or are industry executives leading innovation in e-commerce.

CEO and Co-Founder, Wayfair.com

Shah is responsible for the second largest online home retailer in the U.S. with sales in excess of $500 million. He has been featured in the Boston Business Journal’s 40 under 40 and has won the Ernst and Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year award. Shah has also been a featured speaker at eTail. Watch his interview with Inc.

Director of E-commerce Research, Elastic Path

Software

Bustos is responsible for improving conversion rates and profitability on the web for some of the world’s largest companies. She frequently speaks at industry events including the XCommerce and Conversion Conference. Bustos also runs Get Elastic, the #1 subscribed e-commerce blog, recognized by the WSJ as a top 15 entrepreneur blogs worth reading.

VP Customer Connections,

JetBlue

Stromer oversees the airline’s e-commerce, Loyalty and CSR functions. He oversaw the award-winning redesign of jetblue.com in 2010, most recently cited as the Best Airline Booking Experience by U.S. Air Travelers’ Choice Award. To learn more about Stromer read his interview with Direct Marketing News.

Vice President of E-commerce, Sur La Table

Since 1997, Ertell has focused his expertise on e-commerce. He is a well known figure in online retail and a regular speaker at some of the industry’s biggest e-commerce conferences. Check out Kevin’s blog Retail Shaken Not Stirred.

Vice President of Ebusiness Team, Forrester

Johnson is in charge of leading the ebusiness team working with professionals in retail, financial services, travel and healthcare to optimize sales and service strategies across multiple channels. Her current research focuses on online and multichannel retailing. Johnson has appeared as a retail expert on NBC Nightly News, CNBC and CNN. Check out Carrie’s blog on Forrester.

Research VP Industry Market Strategies, Gartner

Roster’s main focus at Gartner is discovering ways the retail industry can use technology to drive deeper engagement with customers. He communicates global IT trends in retail and wholesale industries and consults with Gartner’s IT clients. In the past, Jeff has spoken at ARTS hosted by NRF. Check out Jeff’s blog on Gartner.

CEO, Fab.com

Goldberg is an experienced entrepreneur, executive and investor who frequently speaks at major innovation conferences such as Disrupt. Prior to co-founding Fab, he held executive roles at Jobster, socialmedian and XING AG. Read his blog Betashop and watch his interview with Credit Suisse.

VP of E-commerce, Dick’s Sporting

Goods

Delobelle currently executes e-commerce functionalities across all channels for Dick’s Sporting Goods. She has a PhD in Social Media and online communities. Delobelle runs her own blog where she posts on retail technology, e-commerce and social media.

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We’ll continue this series in the coming months by looking at thought leaders in CRM, loyalty, analytics and more. We’d love to hear your take on who the thought leaders are in these spaces, so please let us know on Twitter.